Washington, Nov.5 (ANI): The Politico web site has spoken to a dozen political insiders and pulled together a list of President Barack Obama’s ten best, and ten worst, moves of the year.

6. Sending Republican Utah Governor Jon Huntsman to China.

The Mandarin-speaking governor was a perfect fit for the U.S. ambassador’s post. But more than that, picking Huntsman sidelined a potentially formidable 2012 rival for the presidency, who hasn’t been heard from in Washington since he decamped for Beijing - exactly what the White House wanted.

7. Firing GM CEO Rick Waggoner

To satisfy the pitchfork brigade, Obama needed to show that there are consequences for accepting taxpayer bailouts, and Waggoner was the perfect candidate to shoulder the blame. Obama probably wishes he had forced a few more CEOs to walk the plank, to counter a public perception that failed bankers got off scot-free.

8. The Cairo speech

Even for a president who mastered the art of the mega-event on the campaign trail, the sweep of his address to the world’s one billion Muslims was ambitious. “America is not - and never will be - at war with Islam,” he said.

“The speech in Cairo was a high moment,” said Democratic strategist Donna Brazile. “It signaled a shift.”

Plus, the Egypt trip gave us the priceless images of Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and Obama’s personal aide Reggie Love riding camels at the pyramids.

9. Wooing the media

Obama’s been on the cover of nearly every magazine in America, including such non-political pubs as GQ, People, and Vibe. And he’s impossible to miss on TV: Here’s Obama joking about being black with David Letterman. There’s he’s talking Middle East policy on Al Arabiya. Now he’s killing a fly with his bare hands on CNBC.

Obama’s flood-the-zone strategy paid off as the media largely treated the president with kid gloves all year. “I’m Barack Obama,” he said at the White House Correspondents Association dinner. “Most of you covered me. All of you voted for me.”

10. Beating up on FOX News

There is nothing - nothing - so delicious to Obama’s liberal Democratic base than beating up on the network that’s home to Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly. The Obama team’s decision to call out Fox News as “a wing of the Republican Party” was a brush-back pitch of sorts, warning the rest of the media to stay away from Fox’s more negative coverage.